


A Choice to Hold the Stars

by simonsaysfunction



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Arranged Marriage, F/F
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-02-24
Updated: 2015-03-24
Packaged: 2018-03-14 21:20:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,442
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3425984
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/simonsaysfunction/pseuds/simonsaysfunction
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>And then Clarke spoke, words spilling out into the air before she could second-guess herself. “What if we got married.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Beta'd by fandomnerd.

The thought occurred to Clarke out of nowhere. Well, not so much out of nowhere--more that the thought popped up so unexpectedly that if Earth hadn’t beaten the nervousness out of her, she might have jumped.

She had been watching Octavia train with the other seconds, noting their jeering, mocking faces. Even Lincoln still felt the sting of being branded a traitor, not to mention his stint as a Reaper. And Clarke was treated like a pariah, her position so close to Lexa setting her out of range of their ire while she dangled in front of them like a prize just begging to be snatched.

There had to be a way to unite their people. It was obvious they couldn’t just integrate themselves into the ranks of the Grounders--neither group would agree to it. Their alliance was shaky at best, even forged by a common enemy.

Her mind snagged on unite, playing the word over and over again until it took a different shape, molding itself into an idea that was pure insanity. But it had been the same to seek peace with the Grounders in the first place and if blurring the lines between genius and madness was what it would take, then Clarke would be all too happy to oblige.

And so Clarke found herself pushing herself past Lexa’s guard and into her tent, disturbing the Commander from fruitlessly poring over the map of Mount Weather for the hundredth time. It was a routine Lexa had established from the moment they had sent Bellamy inside: she would spend hours running through every strategy she could think of for a ground assault, anything that could cause victory to fall neatly into her lap now instead of waiting for a plan that may not even work.

“Clarke.” Lexa greeted, palms flat against the table.

And then Clarke spoke, words spilling out into the air before she could second-guess herself. “What if we got married.”

Lexa went so still that for a moment Clarke thought time itself had stopped. She didn’t even blink, her chest didn’t twitch with a single inhale. Then all at once she seemed to inflate, her spine straightening as if it had been replaced with a steel bar, her expression holding the smooth serenity it often did during meetings with her council.

“Marriage?” The one word held so much weight that the tent almost echoed with it. Clarke could hear boot falls of the other Grounders milling around the camp in the otherwise deafening silence.

“To unite our people. There’s historical precedent. If we, the leaders, were to marry, then even after the Mountain Men are defeated there could be peace.”

Clarke refused to fidget under Lexa’s scrutiny. What other choice did they have? It was the only way--Lexa had to see that. Didn’t she?

“You are aware that if we are to unite there can be no other for you until my death?” That avenue of discussion surprised Clarke. She had expected something...else. What that ‘else’ would have been, she wasn’t sure, but certainly not this.

If anything, Clarke would have that would be more of her concern about Lexa. She had seen women flit in and out of Lexa’s tent in the time she had spent with the Grounders. It was an open secret that nonetheless remained unspoken. 

“That’s how marriage worked on the Ark, too, Lexa.” The slight smile Lexa gave her was an indication that perhaps she’d sounded sourer than intended.

“I only mean that if you are to find you love another, you must remain faithful or the alliance would be dissolved entirely.” 

Clarke felt like she should be offended by the implication. That she would break apart the one thing, the only thing, keeping her people alive and as safe as they could be. When Finn had died and Lexa had told her love was a weakness, she had scoffed. But if love had the power to cause a war crime, it had the power to do far, far worse.

“It isn’t something I’m going to take lightly.” Clarke hoped that Lexa would understand her underlying meaning.

“We must observe tradition.” Lexa seemed to relax, though her gaze didn’t waver from Clarke’s. “You have proven yourself my equal, however, I must now make my intentions known to your people.”

Clarke had to laugh at that. “Please don’t tell me you’re going to offer up the heart of a freshly slaughtered boar?”

Lexa just gave her an enigmatic smile and went back to her map, leaving Clarke to exit the tent and try not to think of all the possible ways this could go totally, horribly wrong.

\------------

Clarke had gone back to Camp Jaha that night, though not before she had noted that one of the regulars at Lexa’s tent had been turned away by Lexa’s guards. A private smile crept across her features and she returned to the Sky People with a lighter step.

It wasn’t that she was jealous. The twinge in her belly when she saw one of Lexa’s consorts ghosting in or out of her tent was merely worry for the other’s safety. If a knife in the dark took her out, would the next Commander be as amenable to the alliance? Clarke needed that spirit right where it was, and if she happened to enjoy time spent with Lexa, it was merely a bonus.

Maybe if she kept repeating it, she would start to believe it.

She had slept fitfully within the husk of the Ark; the cacophony of metal creaks and groans, the patter of feet over grates, making her toss and turn, longing for the quiet rustle of the breeze through the trees. Her time in Mount Weather had robbed her of the safety given by metal and concrete walls.

Her dreams had been plagued with red canisters exploding before her, of Reapers taking Lexa and Octavia away to twist them into shadows, and of President Wallace and his stolen blood. She ran through the twisting halls, finding the bodies of her dead friends at every turn. The dreams would end the same each time: her gun at Lexa’s head and Lexa’s blade at her throat.

Clarke greeted the dawn with relief. 

She stood outside the doors, head tipped back and eyes closed to enjoy the creeping light. If she pretended, she could watch the rays chase away the specters in gas masks carrying needles the size of spears.

A murmur erupting among the guard at the gate forced her to abandon the calming vision to peer past them. A guard radioed for her mother and Kane just as Clarke spotted the first rider. It was one of the warriors she had mostly seen at Lexa’s elbow, guarding her flank. He led what could only be described as a procession, small as it was. 

Clarke spotted Indra and Octavia as well, the latter smirking at her while the former focused ahead. Lexa rode at the back, another horse tied to her own, packs draped over its tack.

“Heda Lexa of the Tree Clan seeks audience with Clarke of the Sky People and her Council.” The gruff voice of the vanguard rang out and Clarke realized that this was what Lexa had meant by “making her intentions known”. She was presenting what she believed to be a suitable offering in exchange for Clarke’s hand.

“Open the gates.”

Only Lexa, the riderless horse, Octavia, and Indra entered the camp. They dismounted when Clarke motioned for them to follow her into the Ark and into the privacy of the council chambers. Abby, Kane, and the others were waiting for them. 

“I thought I would have more time to explain.” Clarke started when she saw the looks they were giving her. A large part of her welcomed the cessation of open hostility; none of them looked anything beyond confused or apprehensive.

“Explain what? What are they doing here?”

Clarke took a breath and squared her shoulders, lifting her chin to look all six of them in the eye. This decision was best for both sides and any hesitation could take the plan out at the knees. “This is Grounder tradition for a marriage proposal. Lexa and I are going to get married to solidify the alliance once and for all.”

“Whose idea was this? Hers?” Abby’s voice rose, worry and outrage warring for top spot as she glared right at the person she blamed. Clarke should have figured this would be the hardest part. The Grounders could be appeased with tradition and merit, but life on the Ark had been so different that it shouldn’t have surprised her this much to meet resistance. 

“It was Clarke’s.” Lexa had stopped at Clarke’s left, a united front. “It is a sound plan.”

“Once the Mountain Men are taken care of, you know the alliance will fall apart. We can’t survive without them.” 

Abby’s arms crossed over her chest, mouth tugged into a considering frown. Worry was etched into her features. Worry for Clarke. “You don’t have to do this, Clarke. There has to be something else.”

“It’s our only option.” Clarke knew what it looked like. Lexa was manipulating her into doing this, holding the promise of a continued alliance above her head to force her hand. “This way we’ll be safe.”

“You’ve sacrificed so much. I can’t let you do this.”

“It isn’t your decision to make.” 

This wasn’t a negotiation, after all. This was Clarke telling the Council of her plan. This was Clarke stepping up again to do the right thing, the best thing, for her people. 

Now that she had accomplished that, with minimal input from the other Councilors and a nod from Kane, Clarke turned to face Lexa. She had no idea what to say, but if she could negotiate with Lexa and get out of Mount Weather alive, she could accept a proposal she had initiated. “To what do we owe this pleasure, Commander?”

Lexa gave the barest hint of a smile. “I bring an offering in exchange for a final step forward in this alliance. A horse for you, Clarke, as well as furs, winter clothing, and medicine for your people. We provide for yours and you provide for us. Do you accept?”

“I accept your offer.” She almost stumbled over the words, only Lexa’s gaze held her steady. “I and my people are honored.” 

“Then it is done.” Lexa held Clarke’s eyes for a moment longer, then motioned for her to leave with her. Octavia and Indra flanked them and, after only the slightest hesitation, the Council followed suit.

Outside the Ark they were met with a sea of curious eyes. The Sky People had assembled into a crowd, waiting to hear the outcome of this impromptu meeting. Lexa stood with Clarke as she had in the council chambers. When she began to speak, the murmuring quieted, and Lexa’s voice could be heard even by the Grounders outside the gates.

“The Sky Clan and the Tree Clan will be as one. Clarke and I will unite in three days time.”

With that, and a chorus of cheers from the Grounders, Lexa and her entourage turned around and left, leaving stunned silence in their wake. It was as if the camp held its breath until the last warrior disappeared beyond the trees, and all at once hell broke loose.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I'm on a roll with posting today. Beta'd by caelzorah.

Three days felt like three thousand and the waiting was agony.

Clarke felt like every time she turned around there was another complaint, another harsh, judging stare. It was hyperbolic, of course. The deal was done and had been accepted by the Council, and after it was all explained the crowd of Arkers had gone back to their duties. The only stare remaining – sharp, cutting, demanding – was from Raven.

She didn’t expect the mechanic to approve, but she had hoped for understanding. It had to be done for the good of their people – _all_ of their people. Each time she tried to strike up conversation she was denied with a shoulder colder than the vacuum of space.

The walls of the Ark seemed to close in on her with every second she spent inside. The silence within her bedroom was suffocating and she longed for Tondc and the way everything made sense when she could catch Lexa’s gaze. The little piece of the Grounders that she got between Ryder and the fleeting glimpses of Octavia was not a satisfying substitute.

There was no substitute for Lexa.

It was like the impending ceremony hanging over Clarke’s head had shoved her heart on a fast track – a one-way street of thinking about the Commander and her own feelings for the woman. The realization had hit her like a sledgehammer to the chest, ribs going concave, crushing her heart like a vice. It was a beautiful pain – if terrifying – like when she fell from Mount Weather into the river below. Even freefalling from space to the Earth couldn’t have prepared her for the head rush that was Lexa.

Falling in love with Finn had been easy, spurred by naivety and the high of being wanted – of being _needed_. Simple attraction had blossomed into an almost, a possibility of something bigger. It was quick, and painless – until it wasn’t. The fragile tendrils of maybes and might-have-beens were crushed beneath the weight of eighteen innocent lives, burned in the fire of a funeral pyre.

  
She had clawed herself out of the pit Finn had left her in and left shreds of her heart and soul behind, filling the chasm with leadership and a call to arms. Bloodied and bruised, she had stumbled and fought her way back to her feet, gun in hand and iron in her veins. From that Pyrrhic victory, and with the Commander taking station at her side, she had managed to start the foundation of something beautiful.

Lexa came with respect and responsibility – a role and a weight on her shoulders that they both would have to bear and a sense of wonder in spite of it – and Clarke found, with frequency, that it left her breathless. _Exhausted_. Where Finn was infatuation and a fire burning out too quickly, Lexa was time and trust – the slow forging of iron into steel, stronger and sharper than the original ore. Finn was a fall, and Lexa was a slow build; they were nothing alike, and nor were their beginnings.

Whether it would end the same remained to be seen.

Not that Clarke thought that her feelings, as freshly acknowledged as they were, were returned. The stoic Commander maintained her ideology of love being weakness. This was a political union, one that would cement the peace between two vastly different groups of people. Lexa saw Clarke as nothing more than a leader on equal footing. Thinking anything else would be to feed the fragile embers of hope clinging stubbornly to her heart and that could be disastrous.

It was all she could do to keep Lexa out of her head, to stop from analyzing the conversation that had brought them to this point over and over. To keep herself occupied she had taken to hovering in the medical tent or practicing her aim at the makeshift range that had been set up for the soldiers.

Despite the chaos that had taken hold in Camp Jaha after the announcement the rest of the Sky People had seemed to take it in stride. Clarke could feel the worried eyes of her mother against her back more often than not, but that was to be expected. Abby still wanted to believe that there was some other way than marrying her daughter off to a woman whose culture was practically alien.

On this day – when she was shooed away from medical and when her arm shook too much to continue target practice – Clarke found herself wandering the perimeter outside the walls of the camp, Ryder’s ever-silent shadow her only company. She couldn’t decide if she was grateful for the quiet. Despite not understanding the majority of the Grounder language but she had begun to find it soothing – along with a handful of other mundane things: the creak of leather and the smell of its polish, wood smoke and herbs.

Everything that related back to Lexa had become a sort of anchor, keeping her feet planted on solid earth in the moments where she felt like she was floating back up towards the stars. She had fallen from the sky in fire, and collided to the ground in flame, and Clarke wondered sometimes if she should feel concern at the ease in which she had settled into straddling the line between the two: sky and ground, air and earth, _Skaikru_ and _Trigedakru_.

Her sketchpad settled on her lap, pencils liberated from the fallout shelter when everything was uncertain and the Mountain was benevolent, and nothing was to do with alliances and war and siege. The lines took shape through no input of Clarke’s mind, mapping out the planes of Lexa’s face in a rare moment of serenity. She was without paint, looking almost as young as she was if not for the darkness hardship had hollowed into her features.

Filling the page below it, a rough sketch of the tattoo on Lexa’s arm, serpentine along the hard muscle of her bicep. Clarke wondered if she had others, and the stories behind them. She had imagined, in fevered dreams, that Lexa’s skin would be a canvas of colored ink and scar tissue – a map of her histories, her victories and her losses, waiting to be explored by adventurous hands. Her eyebrows formed a crease and she turned the page.

Clarke didn’t notice the passage of time, the shadows across the pages she filled with Lexa growing long until she was squinting to see in the last light of the setting sun. A branch snapped and before Clarke could even flinch towards the pistol she had forgotten in camp, Ryder’s sword was in his hand, tilted in a way that he could skewer the intruder in the spans of an exhale.

“It’s okay,” Clarke murmured, prompting the man to lower his weapon, though not sheath it, as one of the Ark’s soldiers came into view. He had his hands up, clearly uncertain around an armed and ready Grounder. Clarke couldn’t blame him.

“Chancellor Griffin wanted to make sure you made it back inside before it got dark.” He was young, impossibly young, and Clarke wondered for the thousandth time since coming to the ground when she started noticing the youth in everyone else and forgetting it in herself.

“Thanks,” she said, setting her supplies away and standing, brushing grass and dirt from her pants. A tilt of her head and Ryder finally put away his weapon, eyes resolutely on the rifle the guard had slung over his shoulder.

The three of them made the walk back to the camp in silence, Clarke positioned between the guard at the front and Ryder in the rear. If there was one thing to be said about her taciturn bodyguard it was that he took his orders very seriously. Clarke had little doubt that – should the worst come to pass – he would die defending her as his Commander had instructed.

She hoped it would never come to that. People dying for her – _because_ of her – was something that weighed heavily on her shoulders every day, always threatening to drag her down. Taking every death personally was something Lexa had cautioned against, and yet Clarke couldn’t find it within herself to let go as directed. It was not within her nature. She wanted to _deserve_ her survival.

Once inside the gates, the first thing Clarke saw was Octavia and a few other Grounders around a campfire talking amongst themselves. When Octavia spotted her she hopped to her feet and jogged over, nodding to Ryder in greeting. The soldier left them to return to his post.

“We’re here to escort you to Tondc.”

“Lexa said three days. I thought that meant tomorrow.” Clarke had done nothing but think and prepare for her impending union, and yet all of it flew from her mind at the possibility that her schedule was being moved up.

“The ceremony itself is at sunrise, but there’s a feast and some festivities first.” Octavia’s excitement was practically making her vibrate, smile present behind the black of her paint. Clarke couldn’t begrudge her the opportunity to be included as one of the seconds, a chance to be on even footing.

“Let me get my things. And tell the Council.”

Clarke steeled her nerves. It was time.


End file.
